Phalanx drift to the right: movement or contraction or both?

[Erpingham]

At ceresole ? doesn't Blaise de Monluc tell us that both sides created a second line behibd the pike, of arquebusiers and that the result was a voley, a lot of casualties in the oppising front rank, and then back to normal business with exhausting jabbing away on both sides
Roy

Yes, they successfully proved that you could get a lot of people killed to no overall effect on the result.  It never seems to have been tried again.

As to front rank casualties two examples could be given.  At Novara, Florange (who was there and badly wounded himself) says of the 300 - 400 men in the landsknecht's front ranks, only six came through unscathed.  At Ceresole, Monluc records his men's charge (with pikes) flattened the enemy front rank. 

Most descriptions of renaissance pike fighting suggest if you got past the foyning stage and went in at "push of pike" (push meaning to push forward or to lunge rather than anything to do with scrummaging), a vicious fight broke out in the front rank involving throwing pikes, dropping pikes that get tangled up in enemy armour, hacking at pikes with swords and generally going about your opposite number with sword and dagger (pikemen needed short swords, according to Sir John Smythe, not rapiers).

There is some good stuff on pike fighting and what "push of pike" really meant in this article.

[Erpingham]

It is nteresting that in the ECW push of pike, though with deadly intent caused few casualties. How is it that both pike blocks did not mutually destruct with blows to the face? I wonder if both front ranks jabbed for a while and were then pushed, tired, into physical contact not unlike the pikes vertical push?

Somewhere in an old Arquebusier is an account of a 16th-century internecine Scottish battle where both sides' pikes basically stick in the opponents' jacks, and they push away fairly bloodlessly. Indifferently-trained amateurs with little real motivation to kill their countrymen, perhaps?

I think this was the Battle of Langside in 1568 - its quoted in the article I linked to.

[RichT]

This thread has gone into herd of cats mode.

So I'll just pick up one thing:

Roy

Othismos as a push is satisfying in that it is a low casualty option.

Is it? Why do you think so? May main objection to the types of tests Paul describes is precisely that because they are non-violent (without weapons, nobody trying to hurt anybody) they are not testing anything that could ever, in real life, have really happened. As such their conclusion, that files of men could indeed exert force by pushing, is largely irrelevant to the question of what happened in hoplite battles (though it's an interesting conclusion so far as it goes, and does dispense with the squishy humans, fragile shields and asphyxiation type of objections).

In my mental model of scrum othismos, everybody is squashed up immobile and helpless against the man in front, behind (and to the sides?), unable to move, shield jammed uselessly between bodies. Yet everybody has their right arm free, and many, if not most, will still have their spears (those of the front ranks might have broken theirs, but the ranks behind won't have). In such a press, the spears of many ranks will be able to reach an opponent (not just ahead, but to the sides also), and the only defence possible would be either to kill your opponent first, or perhaps to parry away every spear aimed at you (how possible is this?) In such a situation I would expect a very high casualty rate indeed (with head, face and neck wounds) - and with the added complication of the dead and dying remaining jammed in place, no longer pushing or under any control, but still a part of the supposedly controlled file.

I'm open to being told why this mental model is incorrect, or what I am missing.

[Erpingham]

This thread has gone into herd of cats mode.

This thread on drifting has drifted.  Apologies on my part.  Although it is difficult when we are running two or more conversations on overlapping themes what should go where.

I don't apologise for the anachronistic 16th and 17th century examples though.  Provided we don't literally claim they are the same as ancient examples, we can see people in real killing situations, their problems and solutions and this can help us evaluate things, in the same way that modern experiments and even general re-enacting can. 

[Jim Webster]

It is nteresting that in the ECW push of pike, though with deadly intent caused few casualties. How is it that both pike blocks did not mutually destruct with blows to the face? I wonder if both front ranks jabbed for a while and were then pushed, tired, into physical contact not unlike the pikes vertical push?

Somewhere in an old Arquebusier is an account of a 16th-century internecine Scottish battle where both sides' pikes basically stick in the opponents' jacks, and they push away fairly bloodlessly. Indifferently-trained amateurs with little real motivation to kill their countrymen, perhaps?

Indeed you do wonder how many of the men genuinely did have any real enthusiasm for killing. Stay in the back ranks, stay alive and you'll get to go home and get on with your real life

[RichT]

I don't apologise for the anachronistic 16th and 17th century examples though.  Provided we don't literally claim they are the same as ancient examples, we can see people in real killing situations, their problems and solutions and this can help us evaluate things, in the same way that modern experiments and even general re-enacting can.

Absolutely, do not apologise, and please continue to provide these examples. Part of the problem with scrum othismos is that it depends on hoplite exceptionalism. Examples from other periods provide perspective.

[Justin Swanton]

It is nteresting that in the ECW push of pike, though with deadly intent caused few casualties. How is it that both pike blocks did not mutually destruct with blows to the face? I wonder if both front ranks jabbed for a while and were then pushed, tired, into physical contact not unlike the pikes vertical push?

Somewhere in an old Arquebusier is an account of a 16th-century internecine Scottish battle where both sides' pikes basically stick in the opponents' jacks, and they push away fairly bloodlessly. Indifferently-trained amateurs with little real motivation to kill their countrymen, perhaps?

Indeed you do wonder how many of the men genuinely did have any real enthusiasm for killing. Stay in the back ranks, stay alive and you'll get to go home and get on with your real life

Paul has a section on that in Hoplites at War - men's fundamental reluctance to take the lives of others, and how those who do get used to killing have psychological hangovers from it. We're really hardwired to help each other out.

[Erpingham]

Paul has a section on that in Hoplites at War - men's fundamental reluctance to take the lives of others, and how those who do get used to killing have psychological hangovers from it. We're really hardwired to help each other out.

I think we should be cautious about expanding into this area of battlefield psychology.  It can be hard to break from our cultural perceptions and try to enter those of ancient peoples.  It is certainly true in most societies war is an "exceptional" state where different rules apply.  But whether all societies are equally reluctant to kill in war is very moot and too big to tag on here.  Whether there would be a different set of motivations for hoplites if they were citizens doing their duty, mercenaries or a militaristic state might be tacklable (elsewhere), as may how much it mattered who the opponent was (was it easier to kill barbarians than fellow Greeks?). 

[RichT]

Yes, the ancients seem to have been able to overcome their reservations quite readily when faced with a defenceless enemy running away, or civilians in a captured city. I expect they felt bad about it the next day.

Perhaps stronger and more universal is the urge to avoid putting oneself in harm's way, which explains hefty shields, armour, and a fairly tentative style of fighting.

Is there any topic we haven't yet raised in this thread?

[Dangun]

I have no need to refer to any of the literary evidence, which is obviously useless... 

You don't have much other evidence. Your reenactment is certainly not evidence for what did happen.

I am fairly confident that I could demonstrate that frying an egg on a hoplite's breast plate was possible, and I am equally confident that it doesn't qualify as evidence of anything.

Someone can have an opinion, but what they cannot say is that men can't throw spears.  This is what I have now come to demand of those who say othismos is unworkable. In my opinion, the goal post has moved and now critics have to come up with cogent objections based on why they think it unworkable.  If not, the comments are useless to me because I will not know what to test next. I have taken each of the common objections and shown they are no longer valid.  There are still very valid objections to whether othismos could occur. 

This diatribe seems to miss the important historiographical point that we actually care much more about what did happen as opposed to identifying what was not impossible.

[Erpingham]

Is there any topic we haven't yet raised in this thread?

The bit after othismos, where one side ran away?  Spartans, as everyone knows, came back with their shield or on it (unless they were poets).  Other cities seem to think it OK to leg it. 

Oh, sorry.  You meant that as a rhetorical question

[PMBardunias]

I have no need to refer to any of the literary evidence, which is obviously useless... 

You don't have much other evidence. Your reenactment is certainly not evidence for what did happen.

I am fairly confident that I could demonstrate that frying an egg on a hoplite's breast plate was possible, and I am equally confident that it doesn't qualify as evidence of anything.

If you read anything of mine, I am always careful to say that I cannot prove that othismos happened, I can only refute some arguments against it that have been raised by others.  This is exactly the equivalent of a whole bunch of authors telling you that you cannot cook an egg on a breastplate because you can't heat it up enough, or that the bronze would melt before the egg cooks, and you go out and make a video of a breast plate over a fire making omlettes. If every single mention of eggs cooked on breastplates could also be interpreted as a figure of speech, "Damn, its hot enough to fry an egg on a breast plate!", then such references are rendered useless to answering the question.  You don't prove that hoplites were short order cooks, you just prove that they could be when others say they cannot.

Someone can have an opinion, but what they cannot say is that men can't throw spears.  This is what I have now come to demand of those who say othismos is unworkable. In my opinion, the goal post has moved and now critics have to come up with cogent objections based on why they think it unworkable.  If not, the comments are useless to me because I will not know what to test next. I have taken each of the common objections and shown they are no longer valid.  There are still very valid objections to whether othismos could occur. 

This diatribe seems to miss the important historiographical point that we actually care much more about what did happen as opposed to identifying what was not impossible.
[/quote]

On the contrary, you miss the point of my diatribe. I am only interested in proving what could be done. I am a scientist, and all I can bring to this study is an experimental means of falsifying unfounded objections. If you would like to have the millionth round of debate on the historiography of othismos, that is fine, but I will just be vomiting Luginbill and Schwartz at you, with some Van Wees and Goldsworthy where the others go off the rails. There is literally nothing new to say based on the literature.

[PMBardunias]

Paul has a section on that in Hoplites at War - men's fundamental reluctance to take the lives of others, and how those who do get used to killing have psychological hangovers from it. We're really hardwired to help each other out.

I think we should be cautious about expanding into this area of battlefield psychology.  It can be hard to break from our cultural perceptions and try to enter those of ancient peoples.  It is certainly true in most societies war is an "exceptional" state where different rules apply.  But whether all societies are equally reluctant to kill in war is very moot and too big to tag on here.  Whether there would be a different set of motivations for hoplites if they were citizens doing their duty, mercenaries or a militaristic state might be tacklable (elsewhere), as may how much it mattered who the opponent was (was it easier to kill barbarians than fellow Greeks?).

This is a very complicated topic.  The short answer is that humans have an innate reluctance to kill humans, just as we have against eating humans.  Both of these can be over come by culture. For killing, the prime component is the dehumanization of the enemy, and the passing of guilt from the individual to the group. Sadly, we are very good at rationalizing otherness, usually for perceived threat, and easily convince ourselves that we are "only following orders". I think that last sentence describes the whole expansion of the Roman empire.

[RichT]

If you would like to have the millionth round of debate on the historiography of othismos, that is fine, but I will just be vomiting Luginbill and Schwartz at you, with some Van Wees and Goldsworthy where the others go off the rails. There is literally nothing new to say based on the literature.

I'm not sure that's true. No, dammit, I am sure that's not true I've read Schwarz and Luginbill and Frazer and Van Wees and Hanson and Goldsworthy and Lazenby and goodness knows who else, yet when I did some research myself, it came as a total surprise to me that the word 'othismos' is used just three times in the context of hoplite battles, and just once for a battle of hoplite against hoplite, in the whole if ancient literature. That is something new to say, I think.

But I agree that there's no point going over the literary arguments again (let's not). I also agree there is some value in establishing what is not impossible - or rather, to be more precise, in establishing that certain factors do not make something impossible (it remains open whether that thing is still impossible, or at least highly unlikely, for other reasons).

[PMBardunias]

Perhaps stronger and more universal is the urge to avoid putting oneself in harm's way, which explains hefty shields, armour, and a fairly tentative style of fighting.

This is a topic I really tried to hammer in my book.  When chatting with you I will of course often plead authority by way of having physically done much of this in panoply, but I have to caution even more those who think they know how to fight in a shield-wall because they have done some sort of SCA fighting as well.  Everything changes when you can be killed. I believe that hoplites rarely committed to a full strength strike.  Most of the time the jabbed or just feinted.  The reason for this is that you expose so much of the body when fully extending a strike and you are at your most vulnerable.  I am sure we have all seen the kind of windmilling blows seen n some play fighting.  A bigger problem for shield-wall combat is the common technique of prodding a shield to make an opening.  This is suicide with a sharp spear, because it will surely get stuck in the shield-face. Marozzo in his treatise on renaissance spear and large shield show how to kill someone foolish enough to do this.